How it works

It draws your Desktop, it doesn't rearrange it

Your files stay in ~/Desktop. While Desklot runs, it hides Finder's own Desktop icons and draws the same files in its boxes; when it quits, it turns Finder's icons back on. Files only move when you ask: dragging them to another box, archiving or sending them to the Trash.

Boxes and order

• Files that reach the Desktop close together in time share a box.
• Names, colors, symbols, rules, positions and files you moved by hand are saved in ~/Library/Application Support/Desklot.
• In the automatic layout, New comes first, then pinned boxes, live folders and smart boxes, then the rest from newest to oldest. Files you moved by hand win over smart boxes, and smart boxes win over arrival.
• Every display gets its own layer of boxes; the Folders box lives on the main one.

Screenshots

• While Desklot runs, macOS saves screenshots to ~/Library/Application Support/Desklot/Screenshots, without the floating thumbnail. Your previous setting comes back when Desklot quits or when you turn the ledge off.
• ⌃⌘⇧4 never creates a file, so Desklot watches the clipboard for an image shaped exactly like a screenshot (PNG and TIFF, nothing else). Another app copying a bare image would land on the ledge too; you can turn this off in Settings › Ledge.

If it crashes

• While it runs, Desklot keeps a tiny watcher process. If the app crashes or is force quit, the watcher puts Finder's icons and the screenshot location back on its own, so your Desktop is never left empty.
• Opening at login is optional (a launch agent inside the app, in Login Items) and also reopens Desklot after a crash.
• Builds from source also install desklot-restore, which does the same by hand. See Troubleshooting.

Text, QR codes and Tools run on your Mac

Copy the Text, QR codes and every Desklot Tool (convert, remove data or background, merge and compress PDFs, extract text, create QR codes) run on the Mac with Apple's frameworks, like Vision and Live Text. No file is uploaded.

What goes online

• No account and no analytics.
• The trial needs the internet once, the first time you open Desklot. After that it works offline.
• The license is confirmed about once a week when you're online; offline, it keeps working for up to a year.
• Updates: Desklot checks for them and offers them; you choose when to install. You can turn automatic checks off in Settings › General.
• Crash reports: if Desklot crashes or freezes, it sends what failed in the app, the version and your macOS. Never your files, their names, your name or how you use it. Turn it off in Settings › General › Send crash reports.
• More in the privacy policy.

Quit, and it's all back

Quit Desklot from its menu bar icon and your Desktop looks exactly as before: Finder's icons and your screenshot location come back. To uninstall, quit it that way and then move Desklot from Applications to the Trash.